


Camelot Penitentiary

by A_Diamond



Series: Pornalot 2017 [6]
Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Aryan Brotherhood, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Hate Speech, M/M, Nazis, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Prison, Rating May Change, Secret Identity, Slow To Update, Threats of Rape/Non-Con, Threats of Violence, Work In Progress
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-27
Updated: 2017-08-27
Packaged: 2018-12-20 14:14:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11922615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/A_Diamond/pseuds/A_Diamond
Summary: When Merlin gets sent down to Camelot Penitentiary on a three year sentence, he only has one goal:make it out alive.





	Camelot Penitentiary

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Alessariel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alessariel/gifts).



> For the Pornalot bonus prompts: Crime and Punishment & Fake Relationships and Forced Proximity
> 
> This is part of a longer story that I first started thinking about when talking over FTH auction ideas with Alessariel. This was the other option I was considering for you! It looks rough to start, but I promise it's not as dark as the tags make it sound.
> 
> It'll probably be a while before I write more of it, but since I posted the start for Pornalot I wanted to get it up here, too.

_Oh, fuck_ , Merlin thought as the blond-haired, blue-eyed man sauntered towards him. Even if his looks hadn’t immediately screamed Aryan Brotherhood, the two lightning bolts tattooed jaggedly down his bicep would’ve been a dead giveaway.

He didn’t know much about prison gangs, or gangs in general. He’d never had any reason to learn about them before his trial, and then he’d been too busy trying—and failing—to muster a defence against the charges to put any effort into looking into the details of prison social structures. But one of the guys on the transport bus, an older man who seemed way too nice to have just lost a parole hearing for killing three people in a botched bank robbery, had given him a quick rundown of the factions to avoid.

“I was a different man back then,” he’d said after he shocked Merlin with his history. “Young and stupid and scared. I didn’t care one bit about those folks’ lives or the families I was taking them away from. And you’re gonna meet a lot of shitheads in there who are just the way I was. It’s all selfishness and instant gratification for these young bucks. Keep your head down, but don’t let yourself fall in with any of them.”

Merlin didn’t want to fall in with any of them; he was trying to keep his head down. He’d got his lunch tray and taken it to an empty back corner table without making eye contact with anyone. But it hadn’t been enough, obviously, because the very picture of the Übermensch had somehow still zeroed in on him and was headed over with a smirk like Merlin owed him something and he knew exactly how he was going to get it.

He straddled the chair opposite Merlin’s, his obscenely muscled forearms resting on the table and his hands clasped. An iron cross decorated the inside of his left wrist. His steely eyes raked Merlin over, slow and deliberate even though there wasn’t much to see when he was slouching in his seat.

Nervously, Merlin glanced around; some people were watching, some weren’t, and none seemed bothered. No one was going to intervene. When he looked back, the man’s eyes locked with his.

“You’re new.”

Much as Merlin didn’t want to interact with him at all, it was too late not to catch the guy’s notice and ignoring him didn’t seem like it would be good for Merlin’s health. _Keep your head down,_ he reminded himself, _but don’t fall in._

He dropped his eyes to the man’s interlaced fingers and nodded. Maybe it made him seem weak, but he’d rather been seen as a pushover than a threat.

_Head down. Make it out alive._

“What’s your name?”

“Merlin.”

“Merlin. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

Merlin’s gaze darted back up to find a smile on the man’s face that looked warm and inviting; he didn’t trust it at all.

“I’m Arthur,” he went on, “but you’ll be calling me ‘sire,’ I think.”

Snorting at the absurdity of it, Merlin muttered, “You must have a tiny dick.” Then all the blood drained from his face as he realized what he’d just said.

_I’m going to die. I’ve been here for three hours and I’m already going to die._

But Arthur, to his shock, just laughed. “Mouthy,” he noted with a smirk, “I like that.  Welcome to Camelot Penitentiary, Merlin.”

* * *

He knew it wasn’t a good sign when a guard came to his cell more than an hour after lights out—not that Merlin was sleeping—and told him he’d been reassigned.

“Get your personal belongings,” he grunted, ignoring the jeers and grumbles from neighboring cells. He stared, or maybe glared, at Merlin. “Leave the bedding.”

“I don’t suppose it can wait until morning?” Merlin tried, knowing it wasn’t likely to succeed; he sat up and got out of bed even as he asked it. When the guard didn’t answer, Merlin sighed and shoved his two jumpsuits and shower supplies into his laundry bag. He didn’t have anything else; he had to earn the right to books and un-weaponizable trinkets.

Setting down the bag at the door, he held his hands through the slot to be cuffed.

The guard just unlocked the cell and opened the door, forcing Merlin to yank his hands back or risk getting caught on the edge of the slot. “No cuffs, boss’s orders. But you make trouble and you’ll regret it.”

“No trouble,” he promised for whatever it was worth. _Probably not a lot._

Merlin waited until they cleared the row of cells and were walking down a hallway of heavy doors, so brightly lit that the fluorescent bulbs hurt his eyes, before he risked asking, “Where am I going? Why did the superintendent not want you to cuff me?”

Snorting a laugh, the guard shook his head and kept walking. Merlin didn’t ask any more questions.

After a few minutes of silence so tense Merlin started to feel nauseous, with the guard using his keycard to get them passed a couple of doors, they arrived in another cell block. The layout was, as far as Merlin could tell, the same as the one he’d just been removed from. The guard led him to the last cell, at the end of the hallway and closest to the small common area, and unlocked the door.

“In.”

Hurrying to obey, Merlin didn’t get a chance to look at what was waiting for him in the cell until after the door shut resoundingly behind him and the lock clanged into place. It probably wouldn’t have made a difference either way, but he still found himself regretting his rashness when his gaze swept from a neatly made bed, to a rumpled and obviously used bed, to Aryan Arthur lounging against the far wall.

Merlin looked back to the door, desperate to talk the guard out of leaving him there, but the man grinned and waved, then walked off. He knew exactly who he was delivering Merlin to.

 _Shit,_ Merlin thought, _is this who he meant by boss?_

By the time he got turned around again, Arthur was right there in his space, shoving him into the cement wall to one side. Merlin’s bag fell from his startled hands, bounced off his stumbling foot, and rolled away. He couldn’t track it, because Arthur had him spun around with his cheek mashed to the wall before he knew what was happening. One arm was twisted behind his back, the other crushed between his stomach and the wall.

“Thought I’d show you a proper welcome,” Arthur said. He was standing pressed against Merlin, but his voice was pitched to carry. Making a point to everyone else, most likely. Like he’d read Merlin’s mind and wanted to prove it, Arthur added, “And stake my claim.”

Merlin shut his eyes and bit his lip to try and keep the tears at bay. _Head down. It’s not worth dying for._

Instead of going for his clothes, Arthur tilted his face closer in and said, “This is your chance to avoid unpleasantness. Scream, cry, beg. Be loud and make it sound good.”

“Just do it,” Merlin ground out, but Arthur shook him.

“You’re not listening to me. If you don’t make it sound like I’m fucking you,” he growled into Merlin’s ear, pushing his chest harder into the wall, “I’m going to have to actually fuck you, and I think we’d both like to avoid that.”

That made Merlin’s eyes pop back open and he tried to turn his head; Arthur slapped his hand against the wall right beside Merlin’s face and he stopped. He wished his voice didn’t shake so much as it did as he asked, “You... You’re not going to...?”

“Pretend I’m hurting you. Now.”

Between the urgency in Arthur’s voice and his own terror, it wasn’t hard to make a pained noise. Making it loud proved more challenging—his whimper cracked and faded far too quickly. But Arthur’s grip on him eased a little, mollified.

He did it again, with more force. Added a shaky, “Please,” which Arthur cut off with another act of violence against the cement instead of Merlin.

Then Arthur swung him around and shoved until he was falling onto the unoccupied bed, and Merlin had a moment of panic to think, _He lied, why did I believe him, he’s going to_ —before Arthur moved away and put a foot against the frame of his own bed. He started to rock it in a very particular rhythm, then glared and waved an impatient hand at Merlin when he’d been silent in shock for too long.

Feeling equal parts embarrassed and ridiculous, Merlin resumed his wounded noises. Arthur added to them, but his grunts were sounds of satisfaction, his mutterings possessively demeaning.

And then, with a long groan and a few more rattles of the bedframe, it was over. Merlin let out a few more tentative sniffles. Arthur snapped at him to “shut up, Christ,” and nodded approvingly.

When Arthur crossed the couple of steps over to him, Merlin tensed but didn’t try to run—not that there was anywhere to go. Arthur looked down at him, and since Merlin figured it was too late to keep his head down, he braved eye contact.

“I have a certain reputation,” Arthur said at last, too quiet to drift down the hall. “It keeps me safe and it can keep you safe, if you cooperate. Play along and that’s all it will ever be. I may have to be rough when we’re out there”—he jerked his head toward the door—“but I won’t seriously hurt you and I won’t rape you.

“If you don’t do as I say, I still won’t hurt you, but I can’t protect you. If you sell my secret to someone you think is tougher, I’ll probably have to kill him and then you’ll still be on your own. Or maybe they’ll manage to kill me, and I promise you they won’t be so unwilling to take advantage.”

Arthur fell silent, staring Merlin down with raised eyebrows until he realized he was expected to answer. “O–okay, yeah. I just want to get through this, I don’t want any trouble.”

Slanting him a grin, Arthur said, “Everything’s trouble in Camelot.”

Merlin thought he might be starting to understand Arthur a little, and he thought that might have sounded almost apologetic.

“You are going to have to sleep in my bed, though. It’s expected. If the guards don’t see you there when they do their checks, they’ll know something’s off.”

He didn’t like it at all, but it didn’t seem like he had much choice. Merlin scooted off his bed, keeping an eye on Arthur the whole time, and went to stand at the edge of the other bed instead. When he hesitated there, Arthur said, “The side near the wall.”

So Merlin climbed over the mattress to the far side and wedged himself as close to the wall as he could manage, back turned to the room. He felt ready to shake to pieces, drained as the entirety of the day sunk in. _I’m never going to survive three years here._

Arthur got into bed behind him, and though he left a few inches of distance between them, Merlin was acutely aware of his presence as he lay awake most of the night, mind spinning.


End file.
